The present application relates to an imaging device employing microlenses.
Various imaging devices have been proposed and developed. Furthermore, there have also been proposed imaging devices that execute predetermined image processing for imaging data obtained by imaging and output the resulting data.
For example, PCT Patent Publication No. WO06/039486 brochure and Ren. Ng and other seven co-authors, “Light Field Photography with a Hand-Held Plenoptic Camera,” Stanford Tech Report CTSR 2005-02 propose an imaging device employing a technique called “light field photography.” In this imaging device, a microlens array is disposed at the image forming plane for an imaging object by an imaging lens, and an imaging element is provided at the focal position of this microlens array. The microlens array is so disposed that plural pixels on the imaging element are assigned to each of the microlenses in the microlens array. Due to this feature, the imaging data acquired in the imaging element holds information on the traveling directions of light rays as well as the intensity distribution of the light rays. Such imaging data is subjected to predetermined image processing to thereby be reconstructed as an observation image from an arbitrary viewpoint (hereinafter, referred to simply as the parallax image) or an observation image at an arbitrary focal point.